The Archipelago of Eastern Palestine
May 30, 2009
60 years of Israeli occupation and settlement construction(in violation of International law) has resulted in the total fragmentation of Palestinian lands. Indeed Israel’s appetite for Arab land will not be sated any time soon.
As Israeli greed gobbles up more and more land the chances of a two state solution,i.e an economically viable and contiguous Palestinian state alongside an Israeli state,becomes less and less likely if at all even possible anymore.
The only humane, just and durable solution for this sixty-year old conflict is to re-create Palestine once more as one, integrated state, whose citizens irrespective of their religious or racial origin can enjoy equal rights before the law….@
Welcome to the Archipelago of Eastern Palestine…
A land of broken communities,fragmented bantustan’s separated by roadblocks,internal passports,a total lack of free movement,military zones,segregated water supplies (80 percent of West Bank water flows directly to Israel),strips of Jewish only settlements connected by Jewish only roads.
Least we forget Gaza,a prison totally disconnected & isolated from the West Bank & Jerusalem, where the people are not even allowed to rebuild their homes after Israel subjected the people to collective punishment in the form of wholesale slaughter and destruction.
Want to know what full spectrum domination & humiliation looks like…view @ Strange Maps
Getting to the heart of the matter
May 26, 2009
I am all for environmentalism and sustainability,but when it comes to seals & seal hunting common sense seems to go out the window. Instead we get posing celebrities babbling on about their feelings …,well that and crap like this.
Good on Governor General Michaelle Jean for her selfless expression of solidarity with the Inuit people.
Hundreds of Inuit at a community festival gathered around as the Governor General made a gesture of solidarity with the country’s beleaguered seal hunters.
Jean knelt above a pair of carcasses and used a traditional blade to slice the meat off the skin.
After repeated, vigorous cuts through the flesh the Queen’s representative turned to the woman beside her and asked enthusiastically: “Could I try the heart?”
Within seconds Jean was holding a crimson chuck of seal-ticker, she tucked it into her mouth, swallowed it, and turned to her daughter to say it tasted good.
Afterward Jean grabbed a tissue to wipe her blood-soaked fingers, and explained her gesture of solidarity with the region’s Inuit hunters.
Update,May 27th ; Enter the stupid and the absurd aka PETA
PETA yesterday likened Jean’s sampling of seal heart to “taking part in the beating of women in the Middle East because it is part of local practice.
Read ; Jean’s seal meal sparks feeding frenzy
From Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society we get this priceless idiotic quote…
“I’m extremely embarrassed to be associated with a governor-general of my country eating raw seal meat in that manner.”
Like get real Mr Watson..”in this manner”…wtf ?
There’s a song and it’s stuck in my head
May 21, 2009
Damn I love this music,indeed I can’t stop hitting replay. Life is goooood…
The Saving is in the doing
May 17, 2009
As in speak it and write it…
This June, York University student Fred Metallic hopes to make a bit of Canadian university history. That’s when he plans to complete the first draft of his PhD dissertation, tentatively titled “Mi’gmawei Mawio’mi: Goqwei Wejguaqamultigw?” (The English working title is “Reclaiming Mi’kmaq History and Politics: Living our Responsibilities.”) Written entirely in Mi’kmaq, it will be the first PhD dissertation in Canada completed in an aboriginal language without translation. Read @
To lose a language is to loss a hundred or more generations of accumulated knowledge, meaning, and ways of being.To lose the language of ones forefathers must be a terrible thing.
Good on you Fred Metallic in fact mawiglu’sit
Who doesn’t love a good magazine
May 16, 2009
Indeed there is nothing quite as satisfying as kicking back on the couch with a good stimulating mag. One of those rare Canadian magazines that does it,at least for this page, is The Walrus,mind candy yummy.
The business of publishing a monthly mag is a precarious undertaking,funds are always short subscriptions in many cases just do not cover the bills. Without the support & loyalties of readers,staff dedication,foundations & benefactors.. many mags end up expiring to that great magazine rack in the sky much to soon.
With that in mind take a listen to Walrus editor John Macfarlane talk about the magazine, on Here and Now on CBC Radio One.
If you like love magazine’s such as the venerable & indomitable Harper’s Mag, the second-oldest continuously-published monthly mag in the US,you will definitly like love The Walrus.
Support The Walrus,a labor of love,a Canadian gem on the ever shrinking magazine rack of worthy Canadian mags.
The Day After Electoral Blues
May 14, 2009
With the re-election of Gordon Campbell,for a third term,the only thought that comes to mind is why did I even bother voting.
Notice I did not say Liberals or Gordon Campbell & his Liberals. After all in our system,i.e parliamentary democracy one vote’s for the party rather than a particular -member of the legislative assembly-(MLA).The leader of said party holds all the cards,basically he or she is a dictator.
MLA’s otherwise known as backbencher’s serve one purpose. In fact they are but a body attached to a hand that goes up or down signifying yea or nay,depending on the wishes of King Gordo.
Read David Schreck’s latest blog post for the details as a former insider & MLA I imagine he knows of what he speaks.
Now for the meat & potatoes.
Rafe Mair points out why King Gordo’s re-election hurts ,indeed it’s akin to a knee-capping.
1. Fish farms win,this will have huge consequences for the very survivability of wild salmon stocks.Being that B.C is a province built on salmon/fishing ,this is particularly galling.
Last night was a terrible one for the environment. Alex Morton, who has laboured so hard to save our salmon from the predation of fish farms must be bitterly disappointed, as am I.
2. Our rivers & the very notion of public input/stewardship.When I think of this one,I am reminded of Suzuki et al who helped tout King Gordo as some kind of green/environmental warrior while accusing the NDP of being lacks on the environmental…lol.
Private power generators will increase dramatically. The Bute Inlet project, larger in environmental impact than Site “C,” will be approved shortly. When that happens, there will be no turning back. The message I tried to get out and failed in was getting people to understand that BC Hydro is compelled to buy that power at hugely inflated prices that it cannot come close to getting on the market. At present, Hydro has given out contracts amounting to $31 BILLION dollars, rising with each new private power licence and, here’s the rub, for energy we can’t use because it comes with the spring run-off when BC Hydro has full reservoirs thus lots of power. The private power will go to the U.S. and the process, unless reversed, will spell the end of BC Hydro.
3. STV.In that there will be no talk of electoral reform, proportional representation for at least a decade. Rather we will continue to play the FPTP game,even though we all know the deck is stacked.
Read Rafe Mair’s ,It Hurts,and Here’s Why
For the definitive list of everything that King Gordo has slashed and burn, read Geoff Olsen’s column in the Courier…
Who shut down or reduced funding for independent offices like the provincial Ombudsman, the Information and Privacy Commissioner, and Elections B.C.? Who cut air and water quality protection, gutted the Forest Practices Code, lowered standards for wildlife protection, presided over the expansion of industrial fish farms resulting in the decline and possible extinction of wild west coast salmon, and plans to reduce B.C. park rangers to a skeleton crew? Who downloaded costs onto municipalities, eliminated the Independent Office of the Child, Youth and Family Advocate, and did a 23-page review of all persons receiving disability benefits? Who attempted a 60-day, pre-election gag law? Who continues to champion the small business community, but has turned a deaf ear to merchants destroyed by the Canada Line? Who hiked his own salary by 54 per cent?
Wait there’s more…
Liberals’ dodgy megaprojects, from Gateway to the proposed $40-million clamshell over Robson Square. As for the new, $900-million convention centre, that leaky boondoggle alone is twice the price of the former NDP government’s three fast ferries, a nautical scandal from the reign of Glen Clark. Remember that one? It wasn’t the fast ferry scandal that forced Clark out of office, however. What did the trick was a media-led witch-hunt over Clark’s deck, and a conspiracy theory involving his neighbour who built it.
Yep, a damned deck.
Still not done the list just goes on and on,like that damn bunny…
Who is it that engaged in the secretive privatization of public assets? Who restructured B.C. Ferries and brought in U.S. CEO to head the company? Who presided over the dismantling of B.C. Rail? Who has given up our greatest crown jewel of all, B.C. Hydro, allowing private operators to take a crack at power generation? Who gave over the administration of our public electric utility to Accenture, a U.S.-branded company located in an offshore tax haven in the Bahamas?
Read Gordon Campbell’s Liberals privatize,capitalize,destroy
And who can’t remember King Gordo’s sustained attacks on the basic rights of working people that ended in a supreme court ruling.Then there was the so called training period that let business get around the minimum wage laws. After all it takes hundreds of hours to learn how to flip burgers.500 hundred to be exact,or the entire summer school break,the self serving nature of that piece of slave legislation was about as subtle as a bull in a china shop.
And of course one can not forget the infamous Bill 42 ,rammed through by King Gordo.The list of King Gordo’s failings and lies just goes on and on.
Last but not least the truth of the big lie...i.e that worn-out, thread bare talking point about how the NDP is supposedly fiscally irresponsible…
Indeed the Liberal’s build their campaign on that house of cards year after year.With nar a peep from the corporate media,gee what a surprise.
Surprisingly, they revealed that the defeated New Democrats had recorded what was then the biggest-ever surplus — $1.6 billion in the Consolidated Revenue Fund, and $1.5 billion in the summary accounts — in B.C. history.
But the public accounts received little attention from the news media because a few days earlier, on July 23, Campbell had made a pre-emptive strike by releasing the report from his fiscal review panel. And that report, written by Thomson and others hand-picked by the newly elected premier, stated that the New Democrats had left a potential deficit of almost $5.3 billion that could appear three years’ hence.
Read more @ The Tyee
Update ; Alarm bells go off:Elections chief on on low B.C voter turnout.
Chief electoral officer Harry Neufeld said he is disappointed and alarmed by the low turnout of voters for British Columbia’s May 12 election. “Quite frankly the 50 percent mark to me is where the alarm bells go off,” he said.
Only 48 percent of eligible voters cast a ballot in the election, the lowest turnout in decades…Read @
Well I sure as hell hope the alarm bells are ringing…indeed when the numbers are added up we find that Campbell’s “majority government” was in fact,supported by only 23% of all eligible voters.
Yep you read that correctly 23% !
B.C Provincial Elections,did anyone really win…
May 13, 2009
Yesterday’s provincial election saw voter turnout drop to approx 50%…
Voter turnout in the British Columbia election dropped to around 50 percent, despite efforts by elections officials to encourage voting and predictions the figure would rise.…@ The Hook
Which means that once again we are being governed by a political party that most people did not vote for.
Yikes I wouldn’t want to be declared the so called “winner”,I would be blushing & radiating every shade of discomfort known.The phrase ”a hollow victory” jumps to mind.
Rather the Liberal Party,indeed all the political stakeholders, should be asking themselves some very hard questions.
For example, does this really qualify as a win/mandate ,how does one govern with such a low turnout,can the electoral process be simplified,did new ID requirements impair voters ability to vote,what about voting on-line…?
But they won’t it’s much easier to cast blame rather than ask one’s self some very fundamental & uncomfortable questions.
Indeed Gordon Campbell called his, 45% of 50% “victory”, a clear mandate,lol. Receiving 23% support of the people who could have voted,is not a mandate King Gordo no matter how you cut it.
And so it goes… the game is played.
Also check out; Reading the entrails of B.C’s election
And Jody Paterson @ A Closer Look
Onward Christian Soldiers…
May 13, 2009
… marching as to war,
With the cross of Jesus going on before.
Christ, the royal Master, leads against the foe;
Forward into battle see His banners go!
U.S soldiers in Afghanistan seem to be distributing of all things Bibles,translated in Pashtun and Dari.
The following video caused quite a stir around the Pentagon today after al Jazeera reporter asked Adm. Michael Mullen about it at a press conference. It shows soldiers at Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan collecting Bibles translated in Pashtun and Dari to distribute to the local population…[@]
Some how this doesn’t seem to be such a good idea.Indeed the optics are just downright troubling, like really who thinks up this stuff ?
No matter what the angle,there is a very real possibility here for some serious misunderstandings & grief. The last things needed particularly in a place which already has more than it’s share of both.
I suggest these guys re-read their bibles very carefully,a gun in one hand and a bible in the other ,is the total antithesis of everything Jesus stood for ?
